


Spark

by ParadoxinMotion



Series: Five Inch Forest Fire [1]
Category: Firewatch (Video Game), Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Drama, Emotional Infidelity, Fire, Firewatch au, M/M, Okay well late 80's modern, Period-Typical Homophobia, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-15
Updated: 2016-06-15
Packaged: 2018-07-15 04:17:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7207508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ParadoxinMotion/pseuds/ParadoxinMotion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the summer of 1985, Roy Mustang meets a young man whom he initially assumes to be a college student. Through the hazy summer heat and the warmth of a promising few years, time forces them both to acknowledge that forest fires and relationships are not so different. </p>
<p>And sometimes, nobody is able to put out the fire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Spark

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is loosely based off of the popular Game ‘Firewatch’, which came out this year. No prior knowledge of Firewatch OR Fullmetal Alchemist is required, although it might certainly help in understanding the characters and the choices they make.
> 
> Going off of that: these characters will not always make choices you agree with. They are not meant to. They are not heroes or even very good protagonists; the point I hope I got across with this is that they are human. A few lines are taken directly from the dialogue. There’s nothing that comes up that shouldn’t be shadowed by something else beforehand, but I want to warn you all before you start.
> 
> Because this is set in the late 80’s, the LGBT movement was going through several big waves of support and change within its community. I think that mostly drove my characterisation of Ed’s outlook on it; the change excites rather than scares him and he doesn’t want to seem afraid. 
> 
> Okay.
> 
> With that said, this is the premise, and I hope you all enjoy reading! :)

 

 

**1985**

The bar is definitely warmer than it should be, and Roy’s tipsy nerves feel it all the way to his toes. He’s stopped listening to whatever Breda and Havoc were going on about, not so much because it was boring (not that it _wasn’t_ ). Something else has caught his attention.

It’s a beautiful boy, no, a young man judging by his face. Easily eight years his junior, maybe even more. He’s sitting at a table much like Roy’s own, and it’s obvious from his animated hand gestures and the interested looks of his friends that he really believes in what he’s saying.

Eventually, like he always does, Maes calls him out on it. “You’ve been staring off to the left for an awfully long time,” he teases, voice light and cheerful. “Sure you aren’t just stone drunk?”

“Getting there,” Roy tells him. “Approaching it with a devastatingly succinct speed.”

“Jesus, you just get fancier the more alcohol that gets in you,” Jean says unhelpfully.

Roy stands up, albeit slightly unsteadily. “I’m going to get some ice water. Anyone want anything while I’m up?”

Breda waves a hand. “Nah, I’m designated driver for the night, but thanks.”

The others seem to be in a mutual mood of disinterest, so with a shrug Roy heads to the bar.

Or…close to the bar. Slightly to the left. Slightly towards where the animated blonde is still speaking. He doesn’t actually stop until one of the people with him, a girl with light hair and sharp eyes clears her throat. The guy stops talking mid-sentence and turns around.

“You got a question?”

Roy, for all his practice, has no idea what he’s doing. “Might I inquire as to what you’re studying?”

Another companion sitting at the table, another young man who also has light hair but a much more sour face scoffs a laugh. The object of Roy’s attention tosses him a disdainful look and then back around to face Roy. “Physics,” he says, simply. “And I’m not a student. I’m a professor.”

Judging by the young man’s age, Roy’s immediate temptation is to laugh a little. But his bright eyes are totally serious, and his friends don’t seem to find it a joke.

Roy’s second impulse is to gawk slightly, but he’s been told it makes his chin look weird.

“Your speaking is pretty fancy,” Sour-faced guy tosses the words like a challenge. “You done any schooling?”

“Russel,” the girl warns. Roy is currently feeling a little too fuzzy to feel very offended.

“Political science,” is what he answers. No one around the table bats an eye.

“Cool field; not really an area of science I was interested in.” With the light above the table illuminating his face, Roy can drink in the fact that the guy is _beautiful;_ with long golden hair in a short braid down his back and eyes of the oddest shade that almost seems to match. His hands, or fingers more specifically, never seem content to be still, drumming out a nameless tune on the wood of the table.

There is a beat of silence. Roy wonders why he even made this endeavour.

“You wanna split a cheeseburger?” The guy asks him suddenly, frank and cheerful.

Roy blinks. “I beg your pardon?”

The guy gestures up to the bar. “I’m hungry, you look slightly drunk, a little bit of grease would do us both good.”

Roy pauses for a moment longer. He is not hungry in the least. “Sure,” he says.

Grin #1 spreads itself across the guy’s face. When he stands up, Roy realises how short he actually is; barely above his own shoulder. It’s kind of…fitting, somehow, really. He’s obviously a powerhouse of barely-contained papers’ worth of words, the universe must have decided it only fair to put him inside such a body.

What a body, though. The young man leads the way and Roy follows behind him, ignoring the looks he knows he’d be receiving from the others at his own table, if he chanced to look.

\--

“I’m Ed,” the stranger introduces himself, when they’ve seated themselves and his golden hair slides across his neck as he looks up at the menu.

“Roy,” the man in question returns.

“Also, if you actually want a cheeseburger, you’ll have to get your own,” Ed says, frank once again. “I just said half of one so Winry wouldn’t get on my ass about it.”

“Winry?”

Ed jerks his head to the side. “The girl; blonde hair, blue eyes, looks at you like you’re a bug that isn’t performing for the microscope?”

“I saw her,” Roy confirms, smiling slightly at the last description.

The guy at the bar comes up, takes Ed’s order of what Roy knows to be the largest burger on the menu. He looks at Roy expectantly, but he just shakes his head. “Water’s quite sufficient at the moment, thank you.”

“Y’know, Russel and I don’t agree on most things, but he did have a point.” Ed fixes him with that piercing stare thoughtfully. “Is your vocab always like that, or does it get revved up when you’re under the influence?”

“I like to think it expresses itself whenever possible,” Roy answers smoothly.

Grin #2.

“But I can also say things which are understandable to anyone,” he decides to take the plunge. “For instance, you’re very beautiful.”

Ed rolls his eyes and pretends to scoot away on his stool. “Jesus, tryin’ to get in my pants already? What’d you say your last name was?”

“Mustang, and I’m clearly just here for the cheeseburger.”

“Well, Mr. _Mustang,_ you’re barkin’ up the wrong tree.”

“Oh,” Roy says, suddenly crushingly disappointed. “I didn’t want to assume-“ he breaks off. “I apologise.”

Ed gives him a confused look, and then seems to get it. “Oh, nah, I’m gay as hell. It’s not _that._ It’s just that I have a regulation to never go out before eating something.”

“You don’t seem very offended by the idea that I’m just here to ‘get in your pants’,” Roy notes. “Which I’m not, by the way.”

“’Course. I’m sure you just…lost your senior thesis, in my jeans, and need help fishing it out.” Ed flicks his braid off his shoulder. “’M sure there are a dozen reasons we could find for ourselves.”

“At least it’s ‘us’ and not just me,” Roy shrugs. The cheeseburger arrives. Ed’s attention is lost to him and now focussed solely on the burger.

After Ed’s third enormous bite, Roy’s concern starts to manifest itself. “Are you trying to choke yourself so that you don’t have to keep talking to me?”

Ed tries to say something, fails, then reluctantly swallows. “You give yourself too much credit.”

“Well, you _are_ a professor.”

Ed rolls his eyes again. In the overhead lights, they practically glow molten gold. He pauses before taking another bite of burger. “Pretty, huh?”

Roy takes a moment as well, before framing his answer. “Like electron diffraction. The decomposition of light in a prism.”

Ed licks oil off his thumb. “Now I know you’re _really_ tryin’ for those pants.”

“Is it working?” Roy inquires.

Ed sighs. “Tragically.”

Now it’s Roy’s turn to grin. “Good, because I confess I was running out of physics terms I could bring to mind.”

“Political science and physical science just don’t meet very often, huh?” Ed pushes his plate back.

“Well, this time they do,” Roy points out.

Ed absorbs this for a moment, and then he laughs. It’s a clear, undiluted sound that Roy thinks he could grow to need as much as water.

“And your laugh is like Rutherford’s discovery of the nucleus,” he tacks on, pulling one last desperate phrase from his dim storage bank of physics terminology.

Ed tilts his head a little. “Why, ‘cause it makes my face look like a bullet hitting jello?”

Roy shakes his head. “I was thinking more of the gold foil, and how pretty it must have looked.”

Ed stares at him for a few seconds, and Roy is wondering if he fucked something up. Then he curls a hand around to his side, and pulls out a small writing pad, pages of it covered in scribbles. “How ‘bout I just get your phone number before you drive yourself into the ground?”

It might be the slight buzz of alcohol lingering on, but Roy feels a smile spreading on his face. “I certainly won’t be driving anywhere else.”

It’s the arrival of grin #3, and Roy very well thinks he might be becoming addicted.

\--

It turns out Ed isn’t just beautiful in low-lit bars when Roy is feeling the influence of _him_ more than that of alcohol.

He’s beautiful pretty much everywhere else, too.

They go to museums. Stop at science exhibits and hot dog stands. Ed gives Roy a tour of his classrooms and a glimpse at a full one being taught.

“I’d be interested to see your political science figure that one out,” he says in a whisper. “They’re like animals.”

“Aren’t we all?”

Roy kisses him for the first time after they’ve bought ice cream, and they’re sitting on the lawn of the park “like two old people” as Ed described it.

“Implying that we became old together? That doesn’t sound _excruciating_.” Roy smiles around his chocolate ice cream.

Okay, so maybe it’s Ed who kisses him first.

They explore thrift stores. Dusty old book shops that, if they’re very lucky, _might_ have a textbook that Ed needs. (None of them do, but Roy isn’t very disappointed.)

“Who do you teach?” Edward wonders, as they’re meandering out of another fruitless shop in their textbook quest. “What are they like?”

Roy pauses at this, surprised. “Well, why don’t I show you?”

\--

They move in together about a year later. It’s hectic, and ridiculous, and Roy can’t say he’s ever had so much fun moving things like bookshelves (an Elric necessity, as it turns out) and table lamps.

It takes three days, but when they’re able to sleep together in their own bed, in their own house, with crickets chirping outside, Roy considers it worth it. Ed slings a leg over his hip and nuzzles into Roy’s neck, and the time for falling asleep turns into a time for kissing, and then a time for other things. It’s been months since they first ‘did it’, as the kids like to say, but Roy still finds that Ed moving above him, taken over by pleasure and lost, is all the more beautiful for the act being performed in their own bed. That they own _together._

He is so very fond of that word.

\--

Not long after that, they find a quiet time to eat dinner on their porch in the fading light, in the middle of a busy week. Ed can’t cook for love or money, and they’ve both mostly accepted this fact. Roy made them stir fry without complaining, and they eat it while they drink beer. Ed’s legs swing in a carefree manner on the edge of the deck, and Roy considers that he doesn’t think he’s ever seen him this happy before. In old photo albums that Ed has let him finally see after their move, or even real life.

Halfway through their meal, Roy pauses and looks down at him. “Are you at all fond of dogs?”

Ed considers this for a few seconds, taking a sip of beer. “Depends,” he finally says. “Not if they’re bigger than me.”

Roy grins. “Maybe we could go to the shelter this weekend. Pick one out.”

Ed nods. “That sounds cool. But if he shits everywhere before learning to do it on the grass, I’m not gonna clean it up.”

Roy clinks beers with him and looks up at the skyline. “An acceptable compromise.”

True to his word, they drive out to the shelter that Friday. There’s a Shiba Inu puppy that Roy sees at the very end of the row, jumping against its door excitedly.

Their hands linked, Roy points with his free one. “That one,” he says.

Ed squints, and they examine it a little closer. “Hayate, huh?”

“It means ‘Hurricane’, apparently,” Roy notes, reading the sign on the cage.

“I can see that,” Ed agrees, referring to the excited run that the dog is now doing in its limited space.

“Is he okay?” Roy asks, almost tentative.

“I don’t know about _okay,_ ” Ed looks at him. They’re still kneeling close to the ground, and their faces are so close Roy can smell his shampoo. A grin breaks across his face. “But I guess he might be pretty great.”

They buy Hayate, and Roy takes him home proud as a new father. In the next few days they’re so constantly together that Ed begins to jokingly complain that Roy is cheating on him.

“I’d never sink to such levels,” Roy sniffs, holding the dog up by its belly. Hayate yaps appreciatively and wiggles.

“Yeah, yeah.” Ed disappears into the next room and returns with a towel. “Just don’t get water everywhere if you still consider yourself faithful.”

“As a puppy,” Roy affirms, holding up Hayate, and Ed’s quick laugh echoes through the room.

\--

“Would you wanna get married?”

Roy turns over, incredulous. Ed loves to spring these kinds of questions on him when he’s _almost_ asleep, it seems. “Right now?”

Ed rolls his eyes, a visible gesture even in the dark, and also rolls over so that they’re facing. “Not this _second,_ dumbass, but if we could.”

Roy is still processing. “Why are you suggesting this now?”

Ed’s face shutters over, just slightly. “Well, if you wouldn’t _want to,_ that’s fine-“

“Non,” Roy makes a grab for his hands and successfully prevents him from rolling over again. “ _Nein. Jo._ ”

“Alright, alright.” Ed huffs. “I get it in English, no need to brag.”

Roy smiles at him; a visible gesture no matter how dark it is outside. “What I meant was, what brought this on?”

Ed shrugs slightly, fingers tangling lazily with Roy’s own. “I dunno,” is the brilliant answer. “I just think that since we always make such a great team when we do stuff together, we should _always_ be together, y’know?” He picks at the coverlet with his fingers, forehead creased. “But it’s not like we could even if we wan’ed.”

He scowls directly after saying this, as if irritated at his own wordiness, or perhaps the statement’s truth. Roy, on the other hand, has the strangest urge to cry. “So you’re asking me to marry you?”

Ed butts his head against Roy’s shoulder, since his fingers are a little tied up. “In a highly hypothetical, impossible way.”

“I accept whatever hypothetical, impossible things you offer me with fervour,” Roy says grandly. “With _excitement._ ”

Ed scoffs, but his smile belies the sound. “So, what, we just pretend we’re married? Wear rings and shit? I got _shitloads_ on my plate. Like a dumpster-truck’s worth. ‘An I know you do, too.”

Roy leans forward to press a kiss to his nose. “Shitloads between us wouldn’t stop my progress, my dear. Maybe that would be nice. You know it’s the spirit of the thing that counts.” He nuzzles into Ed’s neck, sending shivers down his spine. “Like your spirit.”

“Oh, _barf,_ ” Ed says. Although, granted, they both know he really means, _Oh, I love you._

\--

Most days, Ed’s words prove completely solid. They make a great team; apart, but always the best when together.

_Carbon and oxygen,_ Ed told him once. _We just make things light up wherever we go._

_A poetic way to phrase ‘shit blows up’,_ Roy had told him drily.

But sometimes, like any other couple, even compatible elements end up blowing up in each other’s wake. It’s been a long day at work, and despite his attempts to fall asleep, Roy finds himself childishly unable to do so without Ed. He tries calling, to no response. Tries worrying, succeeds a little too well.

Ed doesn’t come. For hours, and maybe hours after that.

It must be 4 AM when he hears the front door finally open and shut, and then the one leading to the bedroom. He lies still as he listens to Ed change, and hastily brush his teeth. When he crawls into bed, Roy’s first impulse is to ignore it altogether, and remain on his side, facing the wall.

Instead, he rolls over, voice loud in the quiet room. “Where were you, Ed?”

“Out,” is the helpful reply. Even after brushing his teeth, the alcohol is clear on Ed’s breath. Roy frowns. “Had some stuff at the lab, went out afterwards.”

“I didn’t know where you were,” Roy tells him. “You didn’t answer any of my phone calls.”

“Died about halfway in,” Ed responds, almost carelessly. “Knew you’d be alright.”

“But I didn’t know _you_ would be,” Roy returns, harsher than before.

Ed huffs out a sigh, arms flinging up to cover his eyes. “Don’t be a dick, Roy.”

That stings, even though he doesn’t want it to. The thing about _teams_ is that it’s unavoidable to become vulnerable to them, when you become invulnerable to everyone else. His words are biting, and come out before he can stop them. “There’s no need to be selfish, Edward.”

He’s supposed to be the rational one here. Ed is 26 to his 34, and that he’s got a temper on him is an undeniable fact. Maybe the alcohol is getting to them both.

“Jesus, I just went _out_ for a little,” Ed mutters, bristling. “I’m back and _fine._ ”

“And drunk,” Roy comments coldly.

“Yeah, and maybe you should ‘ave considered getting plastered _too,”_ Ed fires back. “Maybe it would’ve relaxed you a little.”

He flops over on his other side in a manner that is both childish in its anger and very grownup in its sadness. Even now, when there’s still irritation bubbling under his skin, Roy wants to apologise. Wants to pull Ed closer; wants to feel his lover in his arms. His beautiful hair is in a tangle and Roy physically aches to comb it out with his fingers.

He does none of these things.

He doesn’t fall asleep for a long time, either.

\--

Time passes. The school year is, as Ed predicted, busy. Summer rolls around but plans to get married get waylaid by work, as things in life so often do. Roy likes his job, and he likes the people he works with, but none of it will ever come close to his love for Ed.

One night Ed comes home, and as they’re just digging into dinner, he blurts out, “Cooper offered me a job. Head labs manager.”

Roy blinks, takes a sip of ice water. Cooper Science Union is a very good school, with an amazing array of programs, especially in the sciences as per the name.

It is also almost a thousand miles away.

“That’s wonderful,” is what comes out of his mouth. Dry. Dusty. It feels insincere even to himself.

For once, Ed doesn’t seem very interested in dinner, even in macaroni and cheese. He fidgets in his seat before saying his next words. “I wanna…I wanna move.”

The words ring hollow in Roy’s gut. Ed smiles nervously. “’Sides, a change of scenery might be nice.”

Roy has grown accustomed to being in love. With Ed, of course, always with Ed. But also his surroundings. The place he works; the faces he sees. They are intrinsically a part of him, almost as much as Ed is.

_Almost_ being the operative word.

“What do you think?” It’s Ed speaking again.

The pause stretches out. Their macaroni grows cold.

“I think you should do whatever makes you happy,” he says, finally. “As long as you come back often.”

Ed’s face falls just a little, and it’s all the more crushing for its silence. In giving one answer, Roy has delivered another. _I can’t move right now, Ed._

He could ask him to stay. He knows that in the nature of Elrics, Ed’s loyalty is also intrinsically wrapped up in him. In some ways, he even surpasses Hayate, who naps peacefully unaware in the corner. He didn’t even wake up for dinner after a long day of chasing squirrels. Roy envies him a little, in this moment.

“Right,” Ed nods, wiping his mouth even though there is nothing on it. “I’ll come back often. You won’t even notice I’m gone.”

Roy tries to smile, but he knows the affair is such a sad one that there’s really no point. Ed looks down at his plate, pokes at his food.

“Anything works if two people are willing to make it,” Roy tries, tone more cheerful. “This isn’t the kind of thing to give up on, right?”

Ed puts his fork down, lets out a shrug and tries, he tries for Roy to smile. “Yeah, guess you’re right.”

They clear the table ten minutes later.

\--

They make it work.

Like most things in Roy’s life, it isn’t perfect, or completely great, but it works. He keeps his job, and Ed finds the time to come home a few times a school year.

But, also like most things in Roy’s life, it’s not a situation meant to last.

It’s shortly into the fifth semester he’s been away when Ed is sent home on medical leave; and it came very close to Roy having to visit _him._ He sits by Ed’s bed at the hospital and listens as one of his co-workers who called Ed’s phone explain what happened: he'd forgotten that one of the people working with him had left careful instructions on how to operate the machinery. Since Ed’s natural tendency to jump in had no one to restrain it, he jumped right in.

“Everything was fine, I think, until the piece fell on him,” the woman on the phone tells Roy. Her voice is kind, and she sounds tired. Roy can sympathise; he almost envies the beautiful man lying on the bed next to him, normally fair-skinned face worryingly pale. His left leg is bandaged in a cast, the wrappings even whiter than his skin. Roy thinks back to what it must have felt like when the piece of machinery fell, in the moments before they tell him Ed blacked out, how painful it must have been.

He shivers.

“It was just weird, you know?” She continues, tones slower than rusty cogs in a broken machine. “He got the instructions, he was totally fine, we leave for a couple hours and when we got back…” her voice trails off. She doesn’t need to continue her story.

“I hope he’ll be alright, Mr. Mustang,” she says, and the sincerity in her voice is comforting even if nothing else in this situation is.

Like most things in his life, it wasn’t him even though it should have been. Work promotions. Dates. Bills being paid. And now this. He feels anger thrumming through the nerves under his arms but he doesn’t even know what to be angry about.

He can’t be angry, anyway. Ed doesn’t wake up until late afternoon the next day, and when he does, he’s still utterly silent.

Roy brings him food and flowers on a tray, offers hot cups of coffee into his beautifully small hands. Ed accepts them, but Roy feels like he _isn’t_ accepting something much bigger than both of them. The nurse comes in and takes his temperature, asks him if he wants water. She sees the way Roy’s fingers are stubbornly curled into Ed’s, but for whatever reason elects not to comment on it. Nice of her. Ed’s had enough shit for long after he’s dead.

All hope isn’t lost, however. True, Ed’s left leg is, from mid-thigh down. It looks ugly, and Roy can only imagine how hard Ed is trying to process the fact that even if he somehow walks again, he will never do it completely under his own steam. Roy aches, aches worse than a missing leg ever possibly could. There are moments where he wishes he could tear his own off and beg someone listening to try.

That someone comes in the form of Winry. Roy remembers her from the bar, from countless times after when he and Ed started dating and they swapped friends like stories. She’s been suspicious of him at first, and made no attempt to hide it. But when she comes into the hospital room, package gripped under her arm, there is nothing but sadness, and the sort of determination he now knows clings to her like a perfume.

She isn’t giving up.

And so, Roy decides, neither is he.

Her package is a miracle, a gift, and a promise. Ed will walk again. Ed might never be the same again.

“Sometimes we have to make sacrifices,” she says.

Roy knows all about that.

\--

Ed’s thirtieth birthday isn’t a big affair. Roy wishes it was, wishes he could tell every person within a thousand mile radius that Edward Elric is alive, and moves around on his metal leg like it’s nothing.

But it’s mostly not a big affair because after he was released, Ed asked to go to the doctor.

“I wanna know,” he says, stubborn. “I wanna know why I spazzed out an’ that shit happened in the first place.”

One doctor turns into two. The day after his birthday turns into a third. They’re all tentative, all inconclusive, but the fourth finally has the balls to say it. “Early onset dementia.”

Ed is frozen in his seat, but he doesn’t look surprised. Roy is certain he had at least an inkling; people with these sorts of things usually do. They become a whole lot smarter than they ever wanted to be.

Roy’s throat is a dry desert, but his lips feel colder than a tundra. His tongue, moving, dragging itself in his mouth, is slow. “Dementia?”

The doctor nods, sighs. His nametag reads ‘Alfons’, and Roy focusses on it rather than staring into nothing. “Is there anything we can do?”

“Developments are being made every day,” Alphons tells him carefully.

“So, not really,” Roy summarises.

He wonders how many doctors look that sorry about these things.

When they leave the cold, sterile room and head back out into the sunlight, Ed speaks before the words _What will you do?_ Are even out of Roy’s mouth. “I’m gonna go back to Cooper.”

Roy pauses on the sidewalk. “What?”

Ed faces him, that golden stubbornness of his the one thing that has never changed in the years they have been together. “I wanna…” He trails off. “Roy, these people _need_ my help. We’re so close. We’re doin’ shit every day that most folks won’t _think_ of for another decade. I can’t just skip out on that.”

Oh, this brave little lion man.

Roy would rather slink back to their cave and hide.

His mouth feels like it did back in the office; stale, dry, and heavy. But he makes the words come out anyway. Forces them. “Okay. If that’s what you want.”

Ed nods, but he doesn’t look satisfied. They keep walking down the street, and Roy’s desire to link their fingers together and just _hold on_ is overwhelming.

But it’s Ed who does it first, anyway. It’s Ed who likes to be brave, even when all other times he’ll hiss like a cat if you so much as try and hug him in public. Roy doesn’t look down when he threads their fingers together, and he doesn’t need to. About halfway home they pass a man carrying newspapers. The disgust on his face is evident, as is the venom in his single word, dropped like the world’s most silent bomb. _“Faggots.”_

Normally the words would make Ed bristle. Today, he doesn’t even look up.

\--

Ed keeps his word, but his brain, always so stubborn, for once refuses to keep his memories. His research falls into shambles, and a stranger might say he looked angry all the time. (Which is true, but what they don’t know is, he’s always angry with _himself._ )

What else does a genius do when he’s powerless?

Blame the lack of godlike blood in his veins, of course.

It’s a curse, but also a bit of a blessing when he’s sent home. When someone finally plucked up the courage to tell him, when the words _permanent leave_ slip into their vocabulary. Ed knows what they mean, Roy tries to make the best of it. His love feels like a child’s offering in the midst of a very grownup problem.

Ed remains angry, but around Roy it manages to be a low simmer. A snake that stays down most days, but Roy can sense it coming like a man who watches for storms. As Ed’s memories go, so does his peace. One day he forgets their anniversary, even though Roy brought him enough flowers to crowd out the porch.

“Are you planting somethin’?” Had been his question.

Roy thought it was a joke-but then he remembered. Ed doesn’t.

Roy gives Hayate to Maes. He’s found that he can’t let two things he loves compete. Ed was always the winner, so he can always be the loser.

\--

There are good days, where Ed looks at him with lucidity and his smiles are the kind that he saves just for Roy. There are also some very bad days, like when Ed tries to cook his own food and Roy feels angry for reasons he can’t justify.

The truth of the matter comes out very simply one night, when Roy is brushing his teeth:

_You can’t do anything without him, and he can’t do anything without you._

His reflection stares at him accusingly, toothbrush dangling from its mouth.

In the upcoming months he will cross states and clamber over mountains, but the thought will follow him like a piece of luggage with a will of its own.

Eventually, he’s forced to tell Alphonse, Ed’s younger brother and sole remaining family in the world. Al is the kind of younger brother anyone would be blessed to have, because he lives 2,000 miles away, but when Roy tells him, his voice is certain. “I’ll be up there as soon as I can.”

His presence seems to soothe Ed, even if nothing else does. Ed is more lucid, more happy, and more comfortable when Alphonse is around, and a fool couldn’t deny that Roy will never be able to provoke that same reaction again.

“I wish you’d told me sooner,” Alphonse tells him his second day in, when Ed is napping on the couch and his younger brother sits at his side. His piercing eyes, a shade lighter than Ed’s own just like his hair, flick up to Roy’s face. Momentarily accusing, then endlessly tired. “But, to be fair, I wish a lot of things.”

“So do I,” Roy answers, and he knows it is not enough. A million reasons could cross his lips as to why he didn’t call sooner, but he doesn’t let them rise. When Ed had told him he was going back to Cooper, he’d told him something else, as well.

“Don’t tell Al.”

\--

It is impossibly hard, for both Ed and Roy.

The nurse who comes over three times a week, Rose, seems to be holding something by the curl of her fake smile for a couple weeks, but somehow it finally seems to escape. “Do you think that Ed would be more comfortable…elsewhere?”

Roy looks up at her, confused for a moment. “Where else would he go?”

She pauses for a moment, adjusting her cap perhaps a trifle nervously. “A home. A permanent one, where he could get the care he needs. I’m doing my level best, Roy, and I’ve really grown so fond of Ed, but I know that I can’t care for him like this forever.”

The rest of her sentence goes unspoken. _And we both know neither can you._

“Let me think it over,” Roy says, and she nods understandingly.

That’s the problem with people you only know through things like this; they understand, but they’ve trained themselves not to empathise. Or maybe the world has trained them.

She knows about them, she does, but she doesn’t bother to say anything. Doesn’t bother to point out the pictures of them together, the smiling image of Ed pressing a kiss to his cheek, the careful way Roy’s fingers tangle in Ed’s beautiful hair. For that, he’s grateful.

He thinks over her suggestion for a week. And then two weeks.

It would be easier; her unspoken point is valid. Roy wouldn’t have to struggle through considering what food to buy and what kind of person Ed will be once he emerges from the bedroom. It would be smoother on the both of them.

He doesn’t make his decision until he finds Ed, leaning against the back of the couch with a photo album in his hand. His hands are covering his eyes, but Roy is quite certain that they’re actually covering an emotion he doesn’t consider himself able to share.

He sits down next to him, holds Ed in his arms. This is the least he can do.

When Ed falls asleep, he stays awake and reads books and drinks. When Ed has had a bad day, Roy drinks. In the winter he sits inside and watches the games, sometimes with Ed sprawled out on the couch, asleep. He drinks then, too.

When he looks over at his face, still feels every aching note of the stringed instrument his heart has become being played by the only man who can, and the man who is forgetting how. He cannot lose him, not to a place full of strangers, even a place full of potential good.

This will be his greatest work.

\--

It actually isn’t. His greatest work is explaining things to Alphonse, explaining to him _in person_ after the brother had flown up once again after Ed called him. Scared. Shaking Roy’s shoulder, to no response. It’s funny how things like _phone numbers_ will stick in your mind long after your own middle name has disappeared.

Roy’s memories of that night are fuzzy. He remembers having a beer, maybe two beers.

Maybe five or six beers.

“You were sleeping on the porch, drunk out of your mind, while my sick brother shook your shoulder, crying.” The scary thing about Alphonse is that he doesn’t make threats, he just carries them out. He doesn’t tell you how badly your sins have buried themselves in the consciences of others, he just lets you understand the fact of it.

Alphonse may be as disappointed as he likes, but no one is more disappointed than Roy.

Ed’s younger brother elects to stay in the guest bedroom while he thinks over what to do.

Roy crawls into bed that night, an early night, and holds Ed for a long time. Cries a little into his hair. Ed kisses his cheeks regardless of their salt and mumbles words so low Roy cannot make them out, except for their tenderness. His love will far outlast any memories he ever had of their time together, and for that, at least, Roy is grateful.

He cries some more.

\--

Alphonse’s decision is no less crushing for how logical it is: he’s taking Ed home to California. Over breakfast he rebukes Roy for the number of bottles in the recycling bin- _rebukes;_ an archaic word for being no less applicable. Maybe it’s especially applicable with Alphonse.

Roy helps Ed pack up a few of his things. Their photo album. His clothes. The hoodie he took from Roy several years ago and refused to give back. He still sleeps in it a lot, actually, but when Roy asked him last why, he had shrugged. “I just like it,” he said. “Dunno why.”

_Because it’s yours,_ Roy mouths the words as he zips up Ed’s suitcase. _And because I’m yours, too._

When they’re going out the front door, Ed’s personality breaks through and he pulls Roy into a hug, doesn’t let go until Alphonse prods him on the shoulder gently. Presses kiss after desperate kiss on Roy’s mouth, his chin, any part of his face he can reach on tiptoes. Roy kisses him back and tastes salt.

“I’ll come and visit,” he promises. “I’ll see you soon.”

Ed nods, frantic like it’s the only thing he knows and he wants to remember it for dear life, and lets Alphonse lead him to the car. He stares out the window, sitting in the backseat just so he can keep Roy’s face in his line of sight for a few seconds longer.

They pull out of the driveway, out of the driveway of their home, and Roy goes back inside. Shuts the door to their house. Thinks about the wedding rings he has buried under his socks for a day that will never happen.

He pawns them a week later, gets $200 dollars. The owner tells him it’s a great deal, Roy thinks if so, it’s the only thing that has been.

A few weeks roll by, he thinks of visiting.

Doesn’t.

\--

**1989**

Maes calls him up two weeks later; tells him about a job he saw in the local paper. “Still have the clipping if you’re interested, actually.”

Of course he knew about them, and of course he knows about this.

So of course, he knows what to suggest.

It’s a job down in Wyoming; a watch for the recent fires that have begun to prove themselves problematic.

“It should be in your copy of the paper,” Maes considers. The sound of his daughter talking excitedly crackles through the background. “Look it over; I think you’ll like it.”

“I won’t see you for a while, if I do,” Roy hedges.

He can almost see the shrug, the forced cheerfulness in his tone. “I think a summer away would do you good, Roy! I can just see you watching the forest, more relaxed than you’ve ever been.”

Roy thinks to waking up with summer light playing across his and Ed’s entangled skin, to drinking a beer out on his porch deck, to watching him laugh. “It does sound interesting,” is what he says.

“Great! I hope you take it. Talk soon, Roy.” The last words are delivered in a quieter tone, one that’s able to say what Maes’ mouth won’t.

“You too, Maes.”

He finds the offer in his copy of the newspaper from two days ago, slightly wrinkled but still clearly legible. It has a phone number and a job description. Roy reads the first thing. Doesn’t look at the second.

He picks up the receiver and dials it in.

“Good afternoon, I was informed by a friend that you’re looking for people willing to help with your Firewatch problem. I think I’d be a great fit for the job.”

 

**End of Part One**


End file.
